The Phantom of the Opera (1962 film)
| runtime = 84 minutes | country = United Kingdom | language = English | budget = | gross = }} The Phantom of the Opera is a 1962 British film based on the novel by Gaston Leroux. The film was made by Hammer Film Productions. Plot The film opens in Victorian London on a December night in 1900. The first night of the season at the London Opera House finds the opening of a new opera by Lord Ambrose D'Arcy (Michael Gough), a wealthy and pompous man, who is annoyed and scornful when the opera manager Lattimer (Thorley Walters) informs him the theater has not been completely sold out. No one will sit in a certain box because it is haunted. Backstage, despite the soothing efforts of the opera's producer, Harry Hunter (Edward de Souza), everyone, including the show's star, Maria, is nervous and upset as if a sinister force was at work. The climax comes during Maria's first aria, when a side of the scenery rips apart to reveal the body of a hanged stage hand. In a panic, the curtain is rung down, and Maria refuses to sing again. With the show postponed, Harry frantically auditions new singers. He finds a promising young star in Christine Charles (Heather Sears), one of the chorus girls. D'Arcy lecherously approves of the selection, and invites Christine to dinner. In her dressing room after the audition, Christine is warned against D'Arcy by a phantom voice. At dinner, D'Arcy attempts to seduce her, but as they are about to leave to his apartment, she is saved by Harry. On the ride back home, Christine tells Harry about the voice she heard. Intrigued, Harry takes Christine back to the opera house, where in her dressing room, a voice tells Harry to leave her there and go. At the same time, a rat catcher is murdered by the Phantom's lackey, a dwarf (Ian Wilson). Investigating the murder, Harry leaves Christine by herself, where she is approached by a man dressed in black, wearing a mask with only one eye—The Phantom of the Opera. Her scream scares the man away, and Harry takes her home. The next day, D'Arcy sends his dismissal to Christine, and when Harry refuses to accept a more willing but less talented singer, he is also dismissed. Visiting Christine at her boarding house, Harry finds some old manuscripts which he recognizes as a rough draft of the opera he has been producing. Questioning Christine's landlady Mrs. Tucker, he learns that it was written by a former boarder by the name of Professor Petrie, who had been killed in a fire at a printers that was to print his music. Making further inquiries, he learns that Petrie did not actually perish in the fire, but was splashed with Nitric Acid while apparently trying to extinguish the blaze, had run away in agony and was drowned in the River Thames. This is confirmed by the policeman who was in the area at the time, but the body was never recovered. Harry is convinced that D'Arcy stole Petrie's music, but leaves it at that, as he believes the real composer is long since dead. That night, confronted in her bedroom by the dwarf, Christine faints from fright and is carried off. She returns to consciousness, deep in the cellars of the opera house, to see the same one-eyed Phantom as earlier, playing a huge pipe organ. He tells the frightened girl that he will teach her to sing properly, and rehearses her with fanatical insistence until she collapses from exhaustion. Meanwhile, Harry, reinstated as the opera producer, is worried about Christine's disappearance. Pondering the story of the mysterious Professor, he checks the river where he had last been seen. At that same moment, he hears the echo of Christine's voice emanating from a storm drain, and soon finds himself following the voice through one of London's water-filled sewers. The faint sound of the organ playing draws him down a tunnel where the dwarf attacks him with a knife. Harry subdues him, and finds himself facing the missing Professor as Christine looks on from a bed (she'd been sleeping). In a flashback, the elderly Phantom relates how, five years before, as a poor and starving composer, he had been forced to sell all of his music, including the opera, to Lord Ambrose for a pitifully small fee with the thought that his being published would bring him recognition. When he discovered that D'Arcy was having the music published under his own name, Petrie became enraged and broke into the printers to destroy the plates. In burning sheet music that had already been printed, Petrie unwittingly started a fire, then accidentally splashed acid on his face and hands in an effort to put it out, thinking it was water. In terrible agony, he ran out, jumped into the river, and was swept by the current into an underground drain, where he was rescued and cared for by the dwarf, whose passion was music and who existed in the cellars underneath the opera house. The Phantom predicts a great operatic future for Christine, and Harry agrees to allow him time to complete her voice coaching. When the opera is presented several weeks later, Lord D'Arcy is confronted in his office by the Phantom and runs out screaming into the night when he rips off his mask and sees his terrifying face. As the curtain rises, with Christine in the lead role, the Phantom watches eagerly in the "haunted" box. Her performance brings him to tears as he hears his music finally presented. Listening enraptured to the music, the dwarf is discovered in the catwalks by a stage-hand, and in the chase, he jumps onto a huge chandelier poised high above the stage over Christine. As the rope begins to break from the weight, the Phantom spots the danger and leaps from his box to the stage, throwing the girl safely from harm. The Phantom of the Opera is impaled by the chandelier before the eyes of the horror-stricken audience. Production Based upon the interest generated by the Phantom of the Opera sequence in the Lon Chaney Sr. biopic, Man of a Thousand Faces, and the success of the 1943 remake, Universal was interested in revisiting the story again. The first plans for remake were in-studio, with William Alland producing and Franklin Coen writing."'Phantom of the Opera' to be Remade by U-I." BoxOffice Magazine. 2 February 1957. Page 33. Plans for this remake fell through, but upon the success of the distribution of Horror of Dracula for Hammer, Universal decided to let the British outfit tackle the project instead, and the project was announced in February, 1959."Foreign Films Gaining Favor in US." BoxOffice Magazine. Page 50. Two months later, Hammer Pictures struck a five-year deal with Columbia Pictures to produce five films a year. On these terms, Hammer's previous arrangements (such as The Mummy for Universal Studios and The Hound of the Baskervilles for United Artists) could be fulfilled, but thereafter, could only produce two pictures a year for other studios. Phantom of the Opera was among the announced for Universal."Hammer, Columbia Pact: 25 Films in Five Years". BoxOffice Magazine. 23 March 1959. Page 15. Over the next two years, the project fell on and off the charts. In 1960, the project was connected with Kathryn Grayson, although she had not been in pictures for some years.Boxoffice Barometer. 29 February 1960. Page 159. According to producer Anthony Hinds, the romantic lead (Harry Hunter) was written for Cary Grant, who had expressed his interest in doing a Hammer horror film, at a time when it was common for American actors to be featured in British films. He was not, as is often supposed, slated to play the Phantom himself.Wayne A. Kinsey Hammer Films: The Bray Studio Years, Reynolds & Hearn, 2002 Production for the film started in November 1961. As with most of the Hammer productions, the film was shot at Bray Studios. Many of the exterior sets were on the backlot and had been used in a number of Hammer productions previously. Interiors of the "London Opera House" were filmed at the Wimbledon Theatre in London, which was rented for three weeks. Over 100 musicians and chorus people were hired for the shoot.Spear, Ivan. "London Report." BoxOffice Magazine, 27 November 1961. Page E-8. The film had a reported budget initially of £200,000,Spear, Ivan. "London Report." BoxOffice Magazine, 23 October 1961. Page E-4. but it was reported after principal shooting to be £400,000, both figures unusually high for a Hammer film. Spear, Ivan. "London Report." BoxOffice Magazine, 15 January 1962. Page E-8. All of the flashback scenes showing how Professor Petrie became the Phantom were filmed with "Dutch angles", meaning the camera was noticeably tilted to give an unreal, off-kilter effect - a time-honored method in film of representing either a flashback or a dream. The Phantom of the Opera opened in New York City on August 22, 1962 at the RKO Palace Theater. In person was Sonya Cordeau, who played "Yvonne" in the picture. Cordeau later went on tour with the film for Universal. "Broadway Report." BoxOffice Magazine. 20 August 1962. Page E-5. Herbert Lom's performance is often praised by critics, and Mike Sutton from the webpage Dvdtimes.com had this to say about Lom's performance: "Herbert Lom's performance as the sad, deformed Petrie is a triumph in every respect. Using exquisitely subtle body language and managing, somehow, to make the expressions in his single eye tell a whole story of pain and frustration, Lom is unforgettable. It may be heretical to say this but when I think of the Phantom of the Opera, it is Lom who comes immediately to mind." When the film had its American TV premiere on NBC, additional footage of Scotland Yard police inspectors (played by Liam Redmond and John Maddison) looking for the Phantom was filmed to pad out the running time. The footage was shot at Universal Studios and Hammer Productions had no input whatsoever. The Kiss of the Vampire and The Evil of Frankenstein also had American-shot footage added to their television showings as well. This was a common practice when it was thought that parts of the film were too "intense". These scenes were edited out and more acceptable scenes replaced them or extended the running time. Cast * Herbert Lom as The Phantom/Professor Petrie * Heather Sears as Christine Charles * Edward de Souza as Harry Hunter * Michael Gough as Ambrose D'Arcy * Thorley Walters as Lattimer * Harold Goodwin as Bill * Marne Maitland as Xavier * Miriam Karlin as Charwoman * Patrick Troughton as The Rat Catcher * Renee Houston as Mrs. Tucker * Keith Pyott as Weaver Music The music in this movie features Johann Sebastian Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D minor, a well-known piece of church organ music that is commonly associated with horror films, mainly due to the music's association to this film. Home video release In North America, the film was released on September 6, 2005 along with seven other Hammer horror films on the 4-DVD set The Hammer Horror Series (ASIN: B0009X770O), which is part of MCA-Universal's Franchise Collection. References External links * * * Category:1960s horror films Category:1962 films Category:British films Category:English-language films Category:Films about entertainers Category:Films based on horror novels Category:Films directed by Terence Fisher Category:Films set in London Category:Films shot in 35mm Category:Hammer Film Productions films Category:Films about opera Category:The Phantom of the Opera Category:Victorian era films Category:Hammer Film Productions horror films Category:Films about opera Category:1962 Category:Film